


In which James is besotted, Sirius is unsympathetic, Remus is devious, and Peter just wants to sleep

by Esinde Nayrall (red_squared)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Community: rs_small_gifts, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-01
Updated: 2014-01-01
Packaged: 2018-01-14 03:47:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1251601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/red_squared/pseuds/Esinde%20Nayrall
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Oh, stop being so grumpy.  That mistletoe nonsense doesn’t prove anything."</p>
            </blockquote>





	In which James is besotted, Sirius is unsympathetic, Remus is devious, and Peter just wants to sleep

**Author's Note:**

  * For [xylodemon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/xylodemon/gifts).



> Written for [](http://xylodemon.livejournal.com/profile)[](http://xylodemon.livejournal.com/)**xylodemon** for the prompt ‘mistletoe’.  Thanks to the modly mods for the opportunity to play! ♥ 
> 
> Originally posted [**here**](http://rs-small-gifts.livejournal.com/180595.html).

_Mistletoe is everywhere_  
_But darling, I'll be true_  
_I can't kiss somebody's lips_  
_Unless that someone's you_  
  
(“Christmas Kisses” from Marty Robbin’s “Christmas with Marty Robbins”)  
  
~~*~~  
  
_Sometime one December…_  
  
“How is he?” Peter asks, when Sirius finally makes it back to the Common Room.  
  
“How do you think he is? Drunk off his arse, curled up in his blankets and he won’t _shut up_.”  
  
“Big deal — he wouldn’t shut up about the potion before, either,” Peter says heartlessly.  “Maybe in a few nights, he’ll get over it and I’ll finally be able to get some sleep.”  
  
“You could be a little more sympathetic,” Remus says.  
  
“No, I could not,” Sirius says. “Look.  We’ve been putting up with this Evans nonsense for months, and now he finally has the answer he wanted.”  
  
“It’s not the answer he wanted,” Remus says, with a small smile.  “He wanted her to look at him.”  
  
There are, Sirius is certain, worse ways to deliver bad news.  Earth-breaking, catastrophic news, even.  
  
But earlier that afternoon, as Lily Evans walked into the Common Room — passing directly beneath the mistletoe that Peter strung up that morning — without even glancing in James’s direction, well…  
  
“He wanted her to do more than just _look_ ,” Peter says.  
  
“Wormtail, are you sure you didn’t mess up the potion?” he asks.  “Spraying it onto the mistletoe is one thing, but the only other way it could have gone wrong is — ”  
  
“I didn’t mess up the potion,” Peter says, staring steadfastly into the fireplace.  
  
“All right, all _right_ , no need to get testy.  I just thought Prongs might like to hear that you messed up the mistletoe, rather than knowing that he doesn’t stand a chance with Evans.”  
  
The brew was a much milder, and therefore not at all forbidden, love potion.  One of the ingredients was a… bit of the person ostensibly making the potion.  In James’ case, Peter had made up the potion, using some of James’ hair.  
  
Once made up, the potion was sprayed onto mistletoe and if — and this was the important bit — the person who walked underneath the mistletoe fancied the person whose bits were in the potion, they’d do something about it right there and then.  
  
“It doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a chance with Evans,” Remus says reasonably.  “For example —”  
  
“Oh, he may still stand a chance with Evans,” Peter says.  
  
“How?”  
  
“Remember when he started up about the bloody potion?  ‘I just want an answer, Wormtail, I just want to _know_ ’ — he even went on about it in his sleep! I warned him he might not like the answer, but he still wanted to do it anyway, and made me spend most of the last fucking term getting all the ingredients in order.”  
  
“So… If you didn’t mess up the potion…?”  
  
“I just didn’t use _his_ ingredients,” Peter says.  
  
“ _Wormtail_ ,” Remus. “Now, that’s not nice.”  
  
“Prongs may like to know,” Peter adds, grinning unhelpfully. “I’m sure it’d cheer him right up.”  
  
“Wormtail, you sadistic — ! Why didn’t you just _say_ so?”  
  
“Poor Prongs,” Remus murmurs, although he’s still smiling as he sips his cocoa.  
  
“Poor _Prongs_? I’m the one that’s had to put up with him all afternoon!”  
  
“And I’m the one who’s had to put up with him all term,” Peter says, smiling contentedly.  “There’s no telling what the potion may actually have revealed. Or not revealed. This way, he’ll mope for a bit, and then realise he shouldn’t ask questions he doesn’t want to be told ‘no, never in a million years’ to.”  
  
“I can’t imagine why,” Sirius says. “If there were someone I fancied, _I’d_ want to know whether they fancied me back — _especially_ if they didn’t _,_ so that I’d know to stop wasting my time.”  
  
“Well, I’m glad you say that,” Peter says. “Because I didn’t use any of Prongs’ ingredients, but I did use yours.”  
  
Remus chokes on his cocoa.  
  
“It’s not funny, Moo— ” Sirius starts to say, but stops when he faces Remus and finds that not only is Remus _not_ laughing, but that he looks as unamused as Sirius himself feels.  
  
“That is _really_ not nice, Wormtail.”  
  
“Look at it this way — at least Prongs can take comfort from knowing that she’s not spurning him because she fancies Padfoot instead.  Plus, his honour would have been compromised if someone reacted to his bits by trying to snog him in front of Evans.”  
  
“Right.  Whereas instead, Padfoot has to worry about being snogged by whoever reacts to _his_ bits,” Remus says.  
  
Peter starts to shoot Remus a ‘seriously, why do you care?’ look when Marlene McKinnon comes into the Common Room and starts to make a beeline for Sirius after passing beneath the mistletoe.  
  
“As I was saying,” Remus says nastily, just as Marlene blinks and remembers that she’s Peter’s girlfriend.  
  
It’s even money whether Peter or Remus look more outraged, and Sirius decides that now is probably a good a time to make a run for the dormitory — the better to break the glad tidings to Prongs, after all.  
  
~~*~~  
  
_A couple of days later…_  
  
“You know, if you’re trying to avoid being macked on by everyone that comes through the door, you could do a better job of it than parking yourself in the Common Room like a sitting duck,” Remus says.  
  
“It’s not _everyone_ ,” he replies.  
  
On the one hand, Sirius doesn’t particularly want to be jumped by that stupid fourth year with the soppy smile, or the whole lot of first years who seem to collectively wet their pants when they’re in range of any of the Marauders.  
  
On the _other_ hand…  
  
“Oh, so, there’s someone you fancy, and you’re waiting to see whether it’s requited?”  
  
“It isn’t.”  
  
“Then why are — ”  
  
“No, I mean it isn’t requited.”  
  
He makes himself turn to look at Remus. “It’s all right,” he adds quickly when Remus eyes him sympathetically. He doesn’t think he can handle Remus’ sympathy right now.  “Better than wasting my time, right?”  
  
“It might have worn off,” Remus offers. “I saw Wormtail fussing with it yesterday.”  
  
He’s surprised that James hasn’t simply taken it down.  Still, most of the rest of Gryffindor Tower thinks it's ordinary mistletoe, and it _is_ seasonal.  
  
“It hadn’t worn off when y— Er. When I got the answer to my question.”  
  
“Well.” Remus comes over and sits on the sofa beside him.  
  
One of the stupid first years comes running back in from outside.  As soon as she spots Remus, she meeps and goes bright red, realising that she’s been caught out of bounds by a prefect.  
  
“I haven’t technically seen you out of bounds, Suzette,” Remus tells her kindly.  As if she could have come in from anywhere else but outside Gryffindor Tower where she’s not supposed to be at this hour. “And I won’t investigate further if you promise you’ll go straight up to sleep in your dormitory.”  
  
“You’re always so kind to those idiots,” he says, wondering why Remus bothers.  He’s also a little irritated at the way Remus smiles after her as she scampers away.  
  
“I’m kind to all sorts of idiots, Padfoot,” Remus says, reaching over to ruffle his hair.  Sirius ducks and pushes him away.  “Oh, stop being so grumpy.  That mistletoe nonsense doesn’t prove anything.  All it does is make the person who walks under it, if they like you, _want_ to do something about it, right?”  
  
He grunts in response.  Clearly, it hadn’t had that effect on Remus, and that’s the important thing.  Worse still is that Remus is sitting next to him, oblivious, and being _kind_.  
  
“So, doesn’t it occur to you that someone who fancied you might, well… Might already want to, for example, kiss you?”  
  
“So?”  
  
“ _So_ , how is their walking under the mistletoe any different to any other day?”  
  
“Well, McKinnon — ”  
  
“That was only once, when she was caught off guard.  She hasn’t done it since, and I bet she’s walked under it since then, but before it wore off.  And look at your first year fan club — all they do is look over at you and giggle.  If the potion were properly potent, any one of them’d be across the room with her tongue down your throat.”  
  
“But…” He stops, and thinks about this.  
  
“See?  So even if Wormtail _had_ used Prongs’ bits, there’s a chance that maybe Evans is…” Remus stops and sighs.  “Maybe she's so used to fancying him, but not wanting to admit it, that she would have felt _what she always feels_ when she walked under the mistletoe, and not given him the reaction he wanted.”  
  
“You don’t have to be _kind_ at me, you know.  I’m not an idiot.  And I know you’re not talking about Prongs.”  
  
Remus snorts. “You _are_ an idiot.  Why is that stuff still up there and making you miserable?  Go and take it down.”  
  
“Oh _fine_ ,” he says.  “ _Accio_ mistle — who puts an anti-summoning charm on bloody mistletoe?”  Now he has to get up and walk all the way over to it.  
  
“Someone who doesn’t want anybody else inspecting it too closely, I would imagine,” Remus says, following after him.  “Here, let me show you how to do it by hand.”  
  
“I don’t need you t—” he starts to say, and then stops, because right here and now it is really important that he kiss Remus.  He is just shifting his weight onto the foot closest to Remus when he looks up and realises where he’s standing.  
  
“Don’t need me to what?” Remus asks sweetly, smiling the way he always does when Sirius’ stupidity amuses him.  “Help you get down the mistletoe that Wormtail must have switched over yesterday with one soaked in _my_ ingredients?”  
  
There is something positively filthy about the way Remus says that, although it could be less to do with the exact wording and more to do with the fact that Remus is occupying nearly all of Sirius’ personal space.  
  
“Gnnh.”  
  
“Yes,” Remus says, before moving closer still. “That’s what I thought.”  
  
~~*~~  
  
_Later the same day…_  
  
_Well, that’s two of the three love-sick idiots taken care of,_ Peter thinks to himself, as he shapes his pillow into an arch.  It’s either going over his head to cover his ears, so that he doesn’t have to listen to James’ sighing. Or it's going over James’ head to cover his mouth, with much the same end result.  
  
As for Evans... Well, she and Marlene are friends.  And while Peter may have mostly forgiven Marlene over the incident with the mistletoe, she _owes_ him (at least until she discovers that he was responsible for the mistletoe, and why).  Evans can either give James the clue he so desperately seems to need, or let him down gently.  
  
And Peter will finally be able to _sleep_ uninterrupted for a change.

**Author's Note:**

> All comments and kudos are appreciated and treasured -- even (especially?) on a fic as old as this one!


End file.
